It's been two years* since the ground opened near Sidoarjo, Indonesia, spewing mud over the homes, farms, and businesses of tens of thousands of people. The disaster quickly acquired the rather endearing name of "Lusi", which is short for "lumpur" (Indone ...

I am basically only on board with holidays to the extent that they are about pie. Thanksgiving? An awful lot of it is about pie. National Pie Day? Oh my yes. Christmas? It's more about cookies than about pie. This is a problem.
{democracy:6}
And a f ...

Hey, is this thing still on? I need to ask you all something very important:
What compels people to add "the subject of this entry was referenced in [obscure webcomic no one has heard of] on [date]" to the end of perfectly respectable Wikipedia entries ...

Now that finals are over, why not allow the cultural crazies to determine my entire blogging agenda? My officemate (certifiably not a crazy) wrote a manifesto about how people should stop using Judaism as an excuse to put up a tree and call it a "holiday t ...

In lieu of a well-thought-out post, I present two brief anecdotes about race and aesthetic relativism.
X. is a generally right-thinking person who abhors mustaches* - which is, of course, the aesthetic preference of all right-thinking persons, because l ...

Eighty-seven years ago, the War to End All Wars was ended. After WWII, the phrase "war to end all wars" became a hilarious catchphrase. Today, we can ignore all that history claptrap and simply fight for peace; there are very few veterans of the Great War ...

I was on jury duty yesterday. Much to my bemusement, the jury pool waiting room was all decked out for Juror Appreciation Week - there were balloons, coffee'n'donuts, and a series of little activities and informative presentations. Since I was only called ...

At work we do much analysis in Water Years, which begin in October. With almost-spectacular timing, the gathering morning fog turned into a pathetic beady drizzle-fog today, too vigorous to ignore but too puny to exercise even the lowest setting on my wind ...

Someone has a mundane question for once:
how are the jobs coming? Have you started already?
Oh yes, that. I've started work, with a bit of an erratic schedule, but it's work. It's okay - enough of a challenge to be interesting, but not so hard as to be s ...

It was the annual trek to bring a mid-sized U-haul full of snow back to campus, for the obvious recreational purpose. Ostensibly a celebration of Nunavut's anniversary, which is officially April 1 but the snow's all off the mountains by then. Not used as a ...

I don't actually know anyone with HIV, or if I do they haven't told me about it. So the main impact of AIDS on my life has been the near-exponential increase of free condom dispenseries in convenient locations, which is actually a good thing - though when ...

When I started riding my bike again two years ago, I expected to have a few scary traffic moments and a little bit of awkwardness changing out of sweaty clothes at work. What I did not expect was that people would start complaining to me about other bicycl ...

Okay, I've slightly missed the main New Year's resolution bandwagon. But the beginning of February will mark the first anniversary of my move to ScienceBlogs, so I figure I have a whole month in which to be self-indulgent reflective and renewal-minded. And ...

From the perspective of this paper's publication, my cross-country move was badly timed. Since my email access has been so sporadic over the past couple weeks, I missed chances to help edit the press release and do a couple of interviews.
The press seems ...

... reading level analysis tool is all the rage; I'm fairly happy with my result. But of course, the little badge is just a snapshot - what ... readers want instructions for how to do this, I'd be happy to add them to this post). It was somewhat gratifying to find that my ...

... to the 13th edition of Scientiae! Today I am happy to share with you what is inside of everybody's heads: BRAAAAAAINS!! Er, ... sometimes whether that is gendered– why am I not as happy and proud about my paper citations as I am about helping others?
Field ...

... time I hear or think of a new reason that I've been unhappy as a grad student, I respond with an enthusiastic yes, yes, that's ... whose successes are interdependent. Really, though, I'm unhappy, I don't trust that I would be able to change that if I stayed, and life ...

... childcare - than their husbands. They are less happy about their marriages, and gain fewer of the tangible benefits (longer ... equality. Actively maintaining the illusion of an equal, happy marriage is part of wifework. If a wife does a good job, her husband has ...

... see me?
Miles Davis - Will O' The Wisp
Will I have a happy life?
Alasdair Fraser & Natalie Haas - The Duchess Of Bedford/ Lady ... though it doesn't make any sense.
How can I make myself happy?
Kitka - Ah Razpasledni Raz Devchonechka
A girl's prayer for her dying ...

... right to be critical of those who present this as a nice happy love story, but you're wrong to confuse the producers of Access Hollywood ... possibly with a certain amount of indignation. I would be happy to be corrected on this.
For the record, let me state that I believe ...

... has a huge problem with women who do not appear to be happy every hour of the day and night. I believe this is magnified with mothers, who are not only supposed to be Happy Smiling People constantly by virtue of their gender but also by virtue of ...

... good intentions about reading them all later, I'd be a happy girl. At least until the paper cuts.
I can't think of any way to make ... meeting (to be held on Wednesday). Fu-zzy! I'm hoping for happy teachy vibes, and if I don't get them, I'll be taking it out on my poor ...

... enunciated to make out. You were supposed to wish me a happy birthday, fucko.
Thankfully for my feeble, hungry ego, the whole freakin' ... guys! Now if only you could sing for a group webcast...
happy birthday!
Actually, this particular message only came twice, but it was ...